Detroit Ghetto News, Videos, & More

Today I went downtown Detroit for “Robocop Day”, an event I had only heard of a few days earlier. I had read about the event and the limited, vague itinerary on mlive.

Original Robocop Day Itinerary:

Noon – ROBOCOP and Detroit Police Department arrivals

12:10 p.m. – ROBOCOP presentation and statue announcement

12:30 p.m. – 1 p.m. – Fan photo opportunities with ROBOCOP

1 p.m. – ROBOCOP and Detroit Police Department departure to protect the City of Detroit

7 p.m. – ROBOCOP throws out the first pitch at Comerica Park

I met a buddy and his co-worker at 1301 3rd St in Detroit, the Detroit Public Safety Headquarters building, which is where the itinerary said the event was happening. Upon arrival at noon, we were told that the event had been moved to Campus Martius Square. Hmm, last minute, but alright.

By the time we drove there, found a parking spot and got to the park around 12:15, there was still no Robocop. In fact, we didn’t see any signs of anything related to Robocop. We walked into one of the buildings, and my friend asks the security guard behind the counter at the information desk, “Where’s Robocop”? He looked puzzled, and after a few moments began stuttering, “Um, uh, I uh, don’t know what you’re talking about”.

After wandering around in the square for a few moments, we stumbled on some people in black shirts that said “Robocop”, handing out cupcakes. “Robocop will be here soon”, one of the said. “Here’s some free cupcakes”.

Fans waiting for the arrival of Robocop

At this point we didn’t really know what to expect. This event seemed so poorly planned, we wondered if the city of Detroit had planned it! However, it was really just a promotion for the DVD release of the latest Robocop movie. One can only assume the movie studios organized the event to generate some buzz in the media.

Robocop finally arrived at about 12:50. Damn traffic. He arrived in a Lincoln Navigator with blacked out windows. There was a crowd of a couple hundred people or so now. There wasn’t really much said by the event organizers, just that you could get your picture taken with Robocop and that they would be going to the Fillmore next. That wasn’t on the itinerary at all, but we couldn’t stay any longer at this point as we had only planned on being here from 12-1 as the itinerary had originally stated.

There is, however, an actual 10 foot bronze statue of Robocop that was supposed to part of this event. Who knows, maybe this was happening at the Fillmore. Supposedly, the location of the statue’s placement is still up in the air.The statue was privately funded though, as you may be wondering how the city of Detroit has money for this. I assure you, they don’t. And if it did belong to the city, they would have already scrapped him.